


Sad Steps - Philip Larkin

by sporktato



Series: To Make Poetry of Life [2]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU
Genre: Batfamily (DCU), Big Brother Jason Todd, Bruce Wayne is a Bad Parent, Fluff But Make It Sad, Inspired by Poetry, Non-Graphic Violence, Whump, references to comics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-02
Updated: 2020-01-02
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:34:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22086448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sporktato/pseuds/sporktato
Summary: Jason comes to in a warehouse with the Joker. It's the same script as the last time he died. The only difference between now and then is that his brothers are with him as well. Surely, that means Batman will come in time this time around? Right?
Relationships: Tim Drake & Dick Grayson & Jason Todd & Damian Wayne
Series: To Make Poetry of Life [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1585585
Comments: 17
Kudos: 231





	Sad Steps - Philip Larkin

**Author's Note:**

> Part 2 of my poetry series!  
> Again, can be read alone, and reading the poem is suggested!  
> Enjoy!!

‘There’s something laughable about this.’ Jason blandly thinks, not laughing, as he watches the man in front of them check the chains around Nightwing’s wrists and ankles, rambling on about ‘how bad it’d be to let this little birdy loose!’. It’s nearly four, both far too early and far too late for them usually. Though, Jason supposes, the night isn’t the only thing that’s late right now. Jason wants to ignore it all; it takes everything in him to not tilt his head back, focus on the way the moon dashes through clouds that blow overhead, past the grimy skylights above their heads. He doesn’t. He shivers slightly, flinching as more cackles reverberate through the concrete room, decked out in cracking spray paint and weapons. Weapons meant for them.

The Joker is still twisting and tugging at Nightwing’s chains, and Jason knows why. No matter what Joker will say, Jason knows what happened. Selina had told him what Dick had done to Joker, how Batman had brought the clown back to life. The Joker was afraid of Nightwing in a way Jason wished he was feared by the freak. That’s not the laughable part though, not really. 

Tim had been gagged immediately; whatever plans of escape the boy may have are stuck behind the rag. It does not show - cannot, between the gag and the mask and the bound wrists and brothers’ lives on the line - but Tim is afraid. Rightly so, with what the clown had done to him in the past, not that Jason knows everything about  _ that  _ incident. Still not the laughable part.

Damian was better off then the rest of them. Jason doesn’t know why, he hadn’t been anywhere near his brothers when he was jumped and drugged, waking up here. The boy is spitting venom as much as Jason wishes he could, unknowing of what the Joker had done to Tim, and of what Dick had done to him in turn. Jason’s story is obviously well known, and Jason can almost hope the threats against the clown are for him. It’s only a matter of time before he, too, is gagged, leaving just Jason and Dick with the small freedom of speech, though neither can speak right now, for very different reasons - Jason’s pleas versus Dick’s promises. Despite all of this, it is  _ still  _ not the laughable part. 

The laughable part is all of the individual parts wrapped up together to make a whole. The fact that, aside from Damian,  _ they had been here before.  _ Because no matter what happens to them, no matter how old or how far from Gotham Jason gets, it always ends like this. Some things don’t change, no matter how much you want them to. 

Joker’s attention finally turns to Jason, after muting Damian, and Jason is struck by the hardness and the brightness and the single-mindedness of that stare. It’s a reminder of both the strength and the pain of being young, of a Robin believing he was untouchable, of a boy dying for his mother. Of a son waiting for his father. The strength is undiminished in Damian’s eyes, fire spilling out where his mouth is stopped. Even in Dick something cold burns in the clench of his jaw, in the agitated twisting of wrists bloody and raw against chains. Jason can feel nothing but  _ old.  _ He can feel nothing but the weary, laughable idea that  _ this was nothing new.  _

A decade or so later, and Jason is still waiting on the absent father - not the first one, mind you, he never wanted that one - to save him from the bad man. He is twenty two and too tired to be scared. He is twenty two, and he knows what happens now. Damian may hold out hope Batman will arrive, he is Jason now, but not alone at least. Dick, ever the optimist, seems way more hopeful of getting out of the chains himself and bashing the Joker’s face in than in the thought Batman may not be too late. Tim is unreadable, though the tension in his body, the blood in his palms from his own nails as the Joker approaches Jason, is unmistakable.

Something grates across the floor; Jason can’t tear his eyes away from the Joker’s to see what it is, but he already knows. It causes the carefully concealed battlefield behind Nightwing’s pretty face to finally heave into the room, startling both of the younger two as Nightwing  _ promises _ another bloody death. The steady stream of guttural F-bombs is a nice change of pace, something different than what it used to be, and it is almost enough to make Jason rethink his earlier statement.

Yet as he bites back a scream, he takes it back. Jason is so  _ tired.  _ It’s bone deep and he just wants to be done all of this so he can sleep, and Batman (Bruce, their keeper, their  _ father _ ) is still not here and that is not new, that is a constant fact, one Jason knows as well as any other. The Sun is bright, Alfred makes the best ginger snaps, Bruce is always just a hair too late. Jason spares a glance at Tim in between swings, and considers if he would rather be alone again, even if it’s just to minimize the kid’s nightmares. 

He thinks he finally laughs, a wheezing, bloody, pessimistic, fate-accepting, should-have-stayed-dead laugh. No fresh pain comes. The Joker says something his deaf ears don’t quite catch over the pain his laughter burns into his ribs. He opens his eyes, not remembering them closing, and sees the clown’s back to him, looking at the other three. The other three Jason thought that even if he was never worth saving, they were. The other three Jason thought Bruce would come for no matter what, and yet in this moment the only thing that seperates Jason from them is the blood in his lungs, not on his hands. ‘Where is He?’ He asks himself. ‘He that is high and preposterous and separate? Is he so separate even to forsake what he has created himself?’ 

Someone not him laughs. The Joker, obviously, pointing the bloodied end of a crowbar now at Nightwing. Saying something about how he “should have started with this one, get the troublemakers out of the way, but Junior and I certainly had some catching up to do!” Jason’s mind is sharp enough still to think Joker didn’t start with Nightwing because he’s a coward. Dick, perhaps for the first time ever, stares Joker down silently, murder clear in his eyes even with the domino intact. 

Damian is struggling now, or perhaps he had been for Jason too, but he is just as gagged and chained as before and it doesn’t matter.  _ Nothing matters.  _ They’re going to die here, all four of them. There won’t be a difference between the Golden Boy and the Blood Son and the Black Sheep and the future Greatest Detective. They’ll all be dead and Bruce will be just a hair late. Again.

Tim must realize that too, or something similar, as the Joker circles Nightwing, psyching himself up. The kid slumps back, eyes not leaving Dick, tears already leaking out of his mask even before the first swing. It comes silently. Never had Jason heard either his brother or the clown be so quiet. Maybe Tim realizes that with Jason already half dead and Dick soon to follow, he’s the oldest brother, for however many minutes it lasts, for however long he and Damian can last. 

Jason meets Dick’s eyes, groping at the thick curtains of unconsciousness for just a little more. He owes Dick this at least, owes it to him to watch him die. However, something in Dick is not his brother; the volatile promises did not stop, only turned inwards. As the Joker circles Nightwing again, gets directly behind the man, Jason watches as, faster than he can processes in his painful old sad haze, Dick puts his double-jointedness to use, wrapping his chained wrists around a white throat and swinging the Joker over Nightwing’s shoulder to hit the ground in front of him. Jason lets the curtains around him close as Nightwing drags the scrambling clown closer to him, chains already leaving purple bruises around his throat.

He comes to in pain. He comes to not in the Cave, but in Doc Thompkins’ clinic, not with Bruce, but with his brothers. Damian is crumpled up in a plastic chair costing less than his drawing pencils and Tim looks like he started in one as well but had slid to the floor in his restless sleep. Dick is sitting on the windowsill, staring up at the moon’s cleanliness, high and preposterous and separate, but rushes to Jason’s side on noticeably unsteady feet as Jason grunts and readjusts, still pawing at those damn heavy curtains. Dick does not speak as he fusses over Jason, and normally Jason would write that off as not wanting to wake the other two but tonight? He lets it slide regardless. 

“B?” Jason croaks, needing to know he’s right, that his facts have evidence. The controlled clenching of Dick’s bruised fists tell him everything.

“You have us, Jay.” Dick goes to run his hand through Jason’s hair before realizing there’s blood on both and aborting his plan jerkily. “You will always have us.” He settles for a quick peck on Jason’s forehead before leaning back, eyes drifting to Tim and Damian.

“Y’know,” Jason pointedly also keeps his eyes on the younger two. “There’s something laughable about this.”

Dick sighs, dried blood flaking onto the threadbare sheets as he clenches them in his fists. “I know.” Somehow, hearing Dick of all people admit that is the most shocking thing about tonight, and does not give Jason the thrill he had once thought it would. “I always hoped he’d-” He sighs again, shaking his head. “Get some sleep, Jay. We’ll get you to one of your safe houses in the morning.”

He stands, most likely to retreat back to the window, and Jason finds it in him to grab onto his wrist, causing him to stop and stare back down. “Will the three of you stay with me? I… I don’t trust him with you. Any of you.” Jason meets his eyes and sees the same tired, fate-accepting, bone-aching, weariness he knows so personally staring back at him.

Dick nods. “Please.”

Jason squeezes his wrist in confirmation before letting it drop back to the thin mattress. He’s asleep again before Dick gets comfy in the window.

In the afternoon, once the four of them are arranged on Jason’s thrifted furniture, Tim quietly informs them all that Bruce never called any of their comms, never asked Oracle to track their signals. He spent the night dealing with basic crooks and thieves and thugs unknowingly while his sons were with the Joker. 

“He does not care, does he?” Damian asks Dick, while he rewraps the elder’s wrists. Dick doesn’t answer, just pulls the youngest of them into a hug.

There’s a sharp look in Tim’s eyes like fractured glass about to shatter as he leans over Jason, checking the stitches taking up the right side of his face. He catches Jason’s questioning look and shakes his head, simply muttering, too quietly for either Dick or Damian to hear, “It’d be laughable, if it weren’t so cruel. Don’t you think?” 

Jason nods, before taking the spare comm off the table and shutting it off.


End file.
